Inaugural lecture - Professor John Foot

The end of the Asylum. How Italy closed down its psychiatric hospitals

This lecture will tell the story of a movement which emerged in the 1960s and 1970s in Italy in opposition to psychiatric hospitals. Its aim was to replace the asylum system with different forms of care. In 1978, this principle was enshrined in an historic law. The movement had won. But the controversy over asylum closure and the future of mental health care had only just begun.